Goldman CEO’s 2005 Pay Was $38.3 Million
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Goldman Sachs Group, the world’s second-biggest securities firm by market value, raised the pay of its chief executive officer, Henry Paulson, by 28% last year to $38.3 million, as the company earned a record profit.
Mr. Paulson’s 2005 pay included a restricted stock award valued at $30.2 million, New York-based Goldman said in a regulatory filing yesterday. The firm’s president and chief operating officer, Lloyd Blankfein, saw his pay rise to $38 million from $29.8 million in 2004, including $10.8 million in restricted stock, which vests over time.
Wall Street’s top five firms enjoyed a second straight year of record profits last year. Goldman’s earnings rose 24% to an all-time high of $5.6 billion. Lehman Brothers Holdings of New York, the no. 4 firm, gave CEO Richard Fuld a 31% pay raise to $34.5 million as profit surged 38%.
“In fiscal 2005, under Mr. Paulson’s leadership, Goldman Sachs’s performance, by almost any measure, was exceptional,” Goldman’s compensation committee wrote in yesterday’s filing. The committee is chaired by James Johnson, the former CEO of Fannie Mae, the biggest American mortgage finance company.
Pay for the chief financial officer of Goldman, David Viniar, rose 26% to $24.3 million. Vice Chairman Suzanne Nora Johnson got $21 million, an increase of 20%, and Chief Administrative Officer Edward Forst got $21.1 million, an increase of 23%.
Goldman paid out 47.2% of its revenue in compensation, comparable to rivals, an increase from 46.7% in 2004. Goldman’s revenue from trading, which accounted for more than half the firm’s total, rose 18%.
Goldman said in filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission that Mr. Paulson received a $600,000 salary in fiscal 2005, unchanged from the two prior years. The company also said the executive received no bonus for fiscal 2005, the same as in fiscal 2004 and 2003.
Messrs. Paulson, Blankfein, and Viniar were provided with a car and driver, a cost falling under “other annual compensation” on the firm’s filing. For 2005, Mr. Paulson’s car was stated as costing $153,931, Mr. Blankfein’s at $187,107, and Mr. Viniar’s at $189,145.
